File photo of Freetown.

Also known as the Republic of Sierra Leone.

Area: 71,740 square kilometers

Population: 7.6 million (2017)

Capital: Freetown

Languages and religions:

English (Official language) and local dialects

60% of the population believes in Islam, 30% of the population is Christian and 10% of fetishism.

Geography: Located in western Africa, bordering Guinea to the north and northeast, bordering Liberia to the southeast, and bordering the Atlantic Ocean to the west and southwest. The coastline is about 485 km long. It has a tropical monsoon climate with an average annual temperature of about 27 degrees Celsius.

Independence Day: April 27

Economy:

One of the least developed countries. The economy is dominated by agriculture and mining, and food is not self-sufficient. The prolonged civil war has devastated the infrastructure and the national economy is on the verge of collapse. After the civil war, the government focused on rebuilding the economy. 

Gross Domestic Product: $ 4.1 billion

Per capita GDP: $539

GDP growth rate: 3%

(Mar 2019) 

Politics:

File photo of Julius Maada Bio. 

Julius Maada Bio was elected president of the Republic of Sierra Leone in March 2018.

The term of office of the president is five years and may be re-elected, but not for more than two terms.

When President Bio came to power, he put forward a "new direction" strategy, taking education, agriculture, tourism and so on as the focus of governance, introducing new measures to develop the economy and realizing economic diversification.

China- Sierra Leone relation

Chinese Vice President Wang Qishan met with Alie Kabba, Sierra Leone's minister of foreign affairs and international cooperation, on January 11, 2019, in Beijing.

Noting that mutual respect was the premise of the state-to-state ties and the friendship between the two peoples, Wang said that China had always respected other countries' cultures, development paths and systems.

Wang said China and Sierra Leone should continue to consolidate their traditional friendship, enhance communication and coordination on bilateral and multilateral affairs, and promote the implementation of the eight major initiatives, proposed at the 2018 Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, in Sierra Leone "in a faster way and in more projects”.

Kabba said that Sierra Leone highly valued friendship with China, and thanked the Chinese side for its sincere and selfless help.

He said Sierra Leone is ready to learn from China's development experience, and deepen bilateral cooperation and the coordination in multilateral affairs, to enhance the development of bilateral ties.

On Friday, Director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the Communist Party of China Central Committee Yang Jiechi met with Kabba. State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi also held talks with Kabba.

China and Sierra Leone formally established diplomatic relations on July 29, 1971.